Chapter Thirty-Six The Nova
Chapter Thirty-Six
The Nova
Somehow the woods were more extensive than when I’d first entered, what I’d thought was minutes to venture within turning into hours of finding my way out.
By the time I’d returned to my spot under the tree, my entire body was sore. My eyelids weighed heavily, and so did my limbs.
I plopped down beside the split willow tree, my things still hanging on miscellaneous branches. With nimble fingers, I sorted the twigs and leaves from my curls, attempting to separate any new knots that had formed while I was in the forest.
I leaned my head back against the trunk of the tree.
The branches above me swayed, feathery leaves fluttering against the starry mural.
No matter how I tried, nothing would put my mind to rest. The heaviness of my eyes did nothing to help me will myself to sleep. Even if I forced myself to rest, I would not dream. I’d tried before. This place made it so you were always sleepless in the forever night.
Sometimes I would hear the flowers taunting their secrets in a language I didn’t know, or the whistle of a breeze to a far-off tune.
Then, like a long-awaited embrace, the sound of my father’s voice.
“Nina!”
I shot up, looking toward the water. The light again, and noises more boisterous than the last.
I scrambled for the pond and ran straight in. My petticoat sucked up the water, taking on its weight until I was waist deep. With my arms raised above the rippling surface, I hovered my hands over the glow. The pictures moved again, the voices muffled underneath.
There was very little time to think; I had to see. I sucked in a deep breath, plunging my head under the water and into the dark.
First there was nothing.
Then, a spark.
One moment of stillness turned into a rush, like I was being pulled through a riptide toward the light. It took a moment of blinking to clear my eyes, a scene unraveling around me.
A muffled explosive noise in my ear.
I was running.
I looked down, thick boots kicking up dry soil. I was in a body, but it wasn’t my own. It was dark, but the lights were plentiful.
In the distance, a town alight with gunfire. The drought-stricken farmland was catching fire in a sweeping line. The crackling grew so loud it roared. I almost couldn’t hear the gunshots.
“Nina!” The word came from my mouth, the body’s mouth. A man’s desperate voice.
Much like the experience in the museum, it was happening through my father’s memories.
He carried an axe, the hands thick and strong. Even with a limp, he made haste, soon reaching the old vineyard barn.
With a heave, the barn door rollers squealed on their track. Red light crept across the hay-swept floor. A small figure slumped in the corner.
“Nina!” The word was more hopeful, but there were tears. I nearly choked on them too.
This isn’t right . . . My mother is alive, I thought.
If my father had traded me for my mother to fall in love with him, was this some sort of cruel punishment?
Her knees were pulled to her chest and her back was to us; when she turned, her face was so warmly lit by the firelight that I almost didn’t notice the blood on her cheek.
She turned fully, her arm shredded, hanging by a generous thread of connective tissue. Shards of shrapnel peppered her skin surrounding the wound.
“You’re still awake.” His sigh of relief.
His hands cupped her face, and she placed her hand over his with a lethargic smile.
A gold band on his finger . . . and the same on hers.
They were already in love, married.
My heart sank. This wasn’t making any sense! What was the point of such a useless bargain if he already had what he wanted?
I looked over beside her in the open stall, a soldier splayed on the ground, the shaved bedding soaking up the blood and a shotgun lying just as discarded as he was.
“We have to go.” My father’s words burst through me. It was like I was a passenger in his body.
She nodded slowly, dozing off.
He gave her face a couple of gentle slaps. “Hey. Hey”—he lifted her face—“we have to remove it and stop the bleeding.”
Her eyes went wide, but his grip on her face tightened as he pulled their foreheads together.
My mother cried in his arms.
“I know, I know. Please,” he begged her, “we are getting out. But we have to go.”
He let her cry, allowed her space to spend her sorrows, even if it was some of the only energy she had left. He held her with the certainty that they would survive . . .
Because he had already struck his deal. But she didn’t know that.
The gunshots neared, the echoes through the valley more frequent as the fire over the hills grew.
My mother took a deep breath. It wasn’t a certain one, but it was a brave one.
She leaned back against the stall door. She tipped her head toward the heavens. Then she nodded, turning her head away.
My father pulled on his belt with one hand, snapping it off to hand to her.
She bit down on the leather, her teeth already indenting it.
He took the axe from beside the anvil, glancing briefly to the outside. The entire town was in flames, and soon the countryside would be too. It wouldn’t be long before the barn itself was reduced to ash, even on the high hill.
He didn’t count or give warning.
With one hoist and a swing, he severed the remaining threads connecting the arm to her shoulder.
My mother screamed, and he threw the axe away to hold her. He tore off his shirt, pressing it to her wound and scooping her into his arms.
She cried, shaking.
It broke his heart to see her like that, to hold her and not be able to take the pain away.
I knew because I felt it in my own chest; everything he felt, I did too.
The absolute helplessness when you’ve done all you can, yet you still cannot spare your loved one from pain.
The screams from my mother were hard enough to listen to, but knowing he’d caused them was worse for him.
It was like being crushed slowly by a pile of stones, building the weight one by one before the rib cage gives way and succumbs.
But he knew it meant they were getting out of there alive.
He hadn’t traded me for unearned love.
He’d traded me for their survival.
Even if he’d made it out, he wasn’t going to live without her.
I choked, water forcing its way into my mouth and down my throat.
The vision faded, and I clawed my way to the surface.
I reached the shore as soon as I breached.
My nails dug into the mud, pulling up the mire flowers as I fought for land.
Water spewed from my mouth and nose, coughing fits overtaking any effort to breathe again.
Then with my first breath, I collapsed and rolled onto my back.